A person feeding a baby will raise the baby's head during feeding—a mother, to hold the child to her breast; or any caregiver, to hold a bottle to the child's mouth. If seated with her feet on the floor, the person may use her arm to raise the baby's head, however, over prolonged periods of feeding, this is likely to result in fatigue of the arm, shoulder and back. Prolonged periods of sitting, too, can lead to discomfort in the person's legs and lower back.
A solution to both problems is for the person to elevate one or both feet on a footstool. This change in posture reduces the strain on her legs and lower back from sitting for long periods. Elevating one or both legs also allows her to rest her elbow or forearm on her raised thigh, thereby relieving the muscular strain of holding up the baby's head.
A footstool with a horizontal footrest platform may elevate the person's leg, but the force applied by her foot to the platform may be largely parallel to the surface of the footstool, depending upon the height of the platform relative to the height of her seat. The friction between her foot and the platform, which keeps her foot on the platform, is proportional to the force her foot exerts normal to the surface of the platform, rather than the force along the surface. Therefore, if the force applied by her foot to the platform is largely parallel to the surface of the footstool, her foot is more likely to slip and she will be required to exert more effort to keep her foot in position. A platform surface with a high coefficient of friction can reduce this slippage, but may be uncomfortable to a bare foot. A lower footstool may minimize the effort required, but may also not provide adequate elevation to ease the fatigue of raising the baby's head.
A footstool with a footrest platform angled toward the person can increase the normal force applied by the foot in relation to the force applied across the surface of the platform. If such a footstool has a platform at a fixed angle, however, it may still not be comfortable, depending upon the height of the person, the height of her seat, the distance of the footstool from the person, and other factors.
Many other problems and disadvantages of the prior art will become apparent to one skilled in the art after comparing such prior art with the present invention as described herein.